


Key Thoughts

by Eratoschild



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Sleeping Together, waking thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:00:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28593642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eratoschild/pseuds/Eratoschild
Summary: A contemplative Henry's thoughts upon waking in the middle of the night.
Relationships: Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor
Comments: 5
Kudos: 60
Collections: Chocolate Box - Round 5





	Key Thoughts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ljparis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ljparis/gifts).



> I wasn't able to complete my assignment for Chocolate Box last year but here we go now, hope you like this little surprise!

Henry woke sometime in the middle of the night to find that they’d somehow drifted apart in their sleep. Only inches between them, but it was too far. 

He turned to move closer again, trying not to disturb Alex, overtaken by an almost angelic quality, so well-hidden in waking. It was difficult but he managed to resist the temptation to run his fingers through those dark, tangled curls.

Settling himself once more against Alex’s side, he did give in to the wanting to reach up and toy with the key around Alex’s neck.

A plain old house key. Certainly once shiny and new, now tarnished, hanging from a steel ball chain. “It’s from before,” Alex had told him the first time he’d asked about it. His old house, before. Alex had told him about how they’d left so much to one day return to- piles of old school papers, his lacrosse trophies, even the sheets on his bed (they were clean, Alex had insisted.)

The cool metal between his fingers, Henry ran a thumb over the cool surface. What would it be like to have had another life before? Perhaps he would ask that very question in the morning. Having been born into royalty, there was no such thing for him. Thoughts turning back to Alex, it occurred to him that he was grateful for Alex’s life before, It had led to his life now. Their life.

He passed several minutes like this, fingering that key, long since grown warm from his touch, thinking about all it meant to Alex, all Alex meant to him. Their life. Was it that now? Was it too soon to say that? Was that the question he should really be asking in the morning?

A soft groan invaded his thoughts, a shifting body next to him. Henry looked up and into sleepy eyes, blinking back at him. Alex shifted, puling Henry even closer to him. With the new angle, the key slipped from his fingers. Lips ghosted over the side of his neck once, twice and then the mumbled words, “Come back to sleep babe.”

What choice had he but to succumb? Taking up the key once more, he gave it a little kiss, let it drop back to where it had fallen against the pillow and lost himself to the feeling of the arms around him once more.

**Author's Note:**

> It’s been a while since I’ve read the book, I started rereading and the part about Alex wearing his old key around his neck, and how his room back home would have been as he left it really struck me, and there was just something that came to mind about Henry thinking about how different it would be to essentially have had another life before his mother became president...and here we are.


End file.
